World Championship Day 2

As anglers prepared for the day a nervous tension filled the atmosphere, particularly around some of the day one leading pack. Plans of attack were altering among those who had been less successful on the opening day of competition. At the top of the field most anglers were sticking to the same patterns they had established and succeeded with on day one.

Lowrance Day Two of the Hobie Fishing World Championship saw anglers power off from the Power-Pole starting line in cool, but clear weather in amazing Amal, They pedalled off to the thundering sounds of AC-DC. Once again many stopped just beyond the entrance to the harbour, hoping the honey hole that had provided so many fish over the past few days was still producing. For the most part it wasn’t and the far majority of anglers left for opportunities to fill their bags further afield after around a half an hour.

The same group that headed to the far south on day one, mainly Australians, Americans and Chinese did so again. The two Swedes who had fished the area the day before stuck closer to the event site over on the eastern side of the bay with Felix Frey heading south to join the others later in the morning. Members of the Brazilian team who on day one had mostly fished the small lake on the other side of the railway bridge to the north east of the event site, changed their plans hoping for more success in the bays and around the islands in the main lake.

The breeze that was present on day one of the championship was gone, and with it gone was the ferocious early bite of Pike that was common across the arena yesterday. During the near glassed out conditions Perch were the more active feeders. If an angler was able to locate them, and unlike yesterday, many competitors had their two Perch before they had any Pike.

But there was still Pike to be caught and many anglers had their recorded Pike on their catch cameras by mid-morning but struggled to fill their of two Pike by the close of the session . A few anglers had their two Pike mid-morning but when the wind picked up around the middle of the day so reactions from the Pike.

As a replica Viking ship rowed by the event site as two canons blasted two huge Bangs! signalling the finish of the world championship day 2. Some of the anglers at or near the top of the field struggled throughout the day and with that there was anticipation that the leaderboard would get a real shake up.

Janne Koivisto from Finland who led at the close of the first day on 265cm was one of the strugglers and only caught one fish ending his day and chance to win the worlds now back in 16th adding just 34cm to his total. Whereas number two Salah Eddibe el Babouchi from Germany (249cm day one) continued with his excellent form, retaining his second place with a 474cm aggregate. Nicholas Wedel from the USA (233cm day one) crashed out of contention on day two finishing in 24th place. Tony Pettie from Australia who sat in forth place, on equal length with Wedel, and although he only brought back three fish today he remained in the top ten, now placed 7th. Cris Debeer (USA), Igor Azevedo (ESP) and Ty Hibbs (USA) all dropped out of the top ten.

Tomorrow Worlds 7 will again start at 7am (Sweden time) after the anglers register at 6:00am and have a mandatory briefing at 6:30am. Live Facebook coverage will continue from the event site before and during the start and then from on the water. The session will end an hour earlier at 2pm and later in the evening at the official Rhino-Rack Dinner and presentation a new world champion will be crowned.

Check out www.hobiefishingworlds for the full results from HFW7 day two and Facebook/IHFWA for all of today’s event site and on water action.
Join us for the final day of Hobie Fishing Worlds 7 tomorrow.